


blossom

by disorderedorder



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Atonement AU (sort of), F/M, WWII AU, Wartime AU, nurse reader
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-29
Updated: 2017-06-29
Packaged: 2018-11-21 04:42:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11350086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disorderedorder/pseuds/disorderedorder
Summary: you were trained to save lives.you were never trained how to deal with losing them.





	blossom

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MagpieMinx (CardinalFox)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CardinalFox/gifts).



> a dose of angst this time! I recently rewatched Atonement and this idea just sort of came to me in a fit of needing some serious angst (please heed the 'major character death' tag). I hope you guys will like Poe and angst, and please leave me a kudo or a comment letting me know you enjoyed it!
> 
> for MagpieMinx, who enjoys Poe and watched me sit and hammer this out in one afternoon.

It had all happened in a flash. You didn’t know when the field ambulances had arrived, but all you really remembered was sitting with Rey, one of the nurses in training, when a shout from down the hall from the ward sister had jolted both of you to attention. You’d both been folding towels, cleaning bedpans when you were alerted, and suddenly you were rushing down the stairs to see what was going on. The back lot of the hospital was littered with stretchers and men in various states of distress, some bandaged, some on crutches, some wandering around, seemingly delirious. You and Rey had only a moment to exchange a glance before being swept into the fray of chaos.    
  
There was a foul, rotten stench pervading the air, that emanated from the ambulances and from the stretchers. Many of the men were caked with dirt and soot, wrapped in filthy bandages teeming with infection. The men seemed lost in a world of their own, many of them who were well enough to stand seemingly oblivious to the pain of their own wounds. Some may have been in shock, you guessed, but you dared not to ask as a doctor you’d never seen before commanded you to make yourself useful and help carry some of the stretchers inside. 

 

You passed Rey a few times, your eyes meeting hers, and a look passed between you two, one you couldn’t fully identify. The situation at hand seemed too much to really describe in words, and you decided that if you were able to see her later, whenever later might be, you’d speak to her. For the time being, you were instructed to find a place for all soldiers well enough to walk to rest, while the ward was being cleared out. There seemed to be a never ending stream of them, leaning on each other or helping each other walk, as they gathered in stair landings and alcoves and waiting rooms. Some of them murmured things at you, things you didn’t understand. 

 

Time passed quickly as you helped assign beds, assist with baths, disperse sets of hospital pajamas to the soldiers. Once they had been properly bathed, you were able to see the extent of some of the wounds. Some of them resembled the anatomy figures you had used in your former training, to your shock and horror. Many of them had been blasted by a mixture of grease, oil, and beach sand that did not come off easily, and your job was to clean what the baths did not remove. It was difficult to remove, and you were scolded twice for working too slowly. You had blushed red in embarrassment, knowing why you were working slowly and knowing that if you were honest with your reasons why, you’d be scolded again.

 

You were sent back to your own ward, where many of the more superficial cases were being placed, and you were told to bring water around for those who needed it. You used a small white porcelain teapot, and while most soldiers were already asleep, you had been told to wake them anyway. You felt awful, but you knew that a man dehydrated for too long was just as much in danger as a man who had lost two or more limbs. Some of them weakly swatted you away, some had accepted the water as gratefully as a sinner accepting salvation from a priest. 

 

For hours, you and the other nurses worked without rest, though to you, the only indication to how much time had passed was the fatigue that quickly overcame you, to where you felt as though every time you closed your eyes, you had to force yourself to open them again, for the fear you’d fall asleep standing up if you kept them shut too long. The ward sisters kept everyone busy, and you had no room to ask for a break or even a moment alone. 

 

The light outside faded and then was completely dark as the ward become dark and then the lights flooded the room with harsh, unforgiving light as everyone worked on. Many of the cases you saw weren’t even the worst ones, though that did not stop you from having to hold your breath or even force yourself to breathe. Some of the soldiers began to remember you, not by your name, but by the color of your hair, or sometimes the sound of your voice. They reached out to you to ask for more water, or for you to loosen bandages. You carried stacks of bedpans, six high, back and forth across the ward until your arms felt like rubber. 

  
Now, as the clock reads a quarter to four in the morning, you’ve busied yourself with making beds and folding towels in an empty ward. You try not to focus too much on the fact that this ward was mostly full of the most serious cases, many of which had died only a few hours ago. You finish turning down the sheets on a bed, and just as you’re about to slip a new pillow into a fresh pillowcase, your ward sister appears in the doorway. 

 

“There’s a soldier in your ward, end of the row, behind a curtain. Sit with him a while, hold his hand,” she says. The tone in her voice doesn’t leave room for argument.

 

“Yes, Sister,” you murmur as you lay the pillow and pillowcase aside. 

 

You don’t need to follow her, but you do anyway, your steps slow and deliberate, your heart racing because you have no idea which soldier it is, or how bad his wounds might be. Once you reach your own ward, the ward sister busies herself with another job, leaving you no choice but to do as you’re told. 

 

You take a deep breath as you approach the last bed in the row, enclosed behind a clean white curtain. There’s a chair just outside the curtain, and you pull it with you as you draw the curtain back. In the bed is a soldier, one you think you faintly recall from earlier. Unlike many of the others, he had been quiet, undemanding, and only asked for water when he knew you were close. At the foot of the bed is a folder containing his papers, and while he rests, you glance over them briefly. His name strikes you with familiarity, not because you ever knew him previously, but because it confirms that he is the soldier you remember from earlier. 

 

“Poe?” you say, quietly, as not to disturb the other soldiers outside the curtain. In the dim light, he doesn’t look like a man of thirty-two, but much younger. Late twenties, maybe, but it only makes the situation sadder. 

 

“Hm?” he murmurs sleepily, turning over in his bed. There’s a bandage around his head, a sterile towel fixed over a large spot over his right ear. 

 

“The ward sister told me to come sit with you,” you say, pulling the chair close to his bedside and sitting, taking his hand in yours. His skin is cool and a bit damp, likely from his fever. 

 

Poe opens his eyes, blinking a little at the dim candlelight, and then turns to you, his dark eyes reflecting the light just enough to make them look golden. His dark curls are damp, and they curl around the bandages that appear damp with perspiration as well.

 

“You must be tired,” he says, his voice little more than a hoarse whisper, but then he clears his throat, and reaches for the little teapot in your hands. You lift it to the corner of his lips, allowing him some cold water, and his free hand closes around yours. He gently pushes you away once he’s done, and he sighs in relief, closing his eyes again. 

 

“It’s so quiet, Blossom,” he says. “I...I don’t know where the rest of my unit is.”

 

Your heart sinks at the nickname, and for a moment, you turn your head away so you can force yourself not to tear up.

 

“My mother always told me...told me that I shouldn’t leave them behind. That’s what she said before I left.” Poe stirs a little, tries to pull his blankets up a bit. “But I don’t know where they are, Blossom.”

 

You don’t know how to answer, exactly, so you stroke the backs of his fingers with your thumb, and it’s only then you notice a thick silver band around his right ring finger. 

 

“It was my best friend’s,” he says as you rub the soot away from the ring. “He...I lost him somewhere out there. Somewhere. I promised I’d bring him home, but...he’s gone now. So I have to bring this back to his mother.”   
  
You rub more soot off, revealing a small engraving in cursive. It’s almost too dark to read it, but it’s a short name. Maybe a last name. Solo. 

 

“I was telling him to go ahead, go and I’d cover him,” Poe says, turning his hand over. “But then...they started shooting from above. They strafed us and they got him first. I...I thought I could save him. I carried him...for miles…”

 

A tear shimmers at the corner of Poe’s eye, and without thinking, you reach up and gently wipe it away with the soft towel from the bedside table. 

 

“Thank you, Blossom,” Poe whispers, and for a moment, you think he’s gone back to sleep when he closes his eyes. 

“My mother can never stop talking about you,” he says, and you know he can’t be talking about you now. “She remembers when you came to the airfield...you were going to paint the planes. Remember, you painted flowers on hers? And...you visited every day after that...for months. I saw you every day for a summer...and wrote you every day for the rest of the year...until next summer…” 

 

You wish you knew who Poe was talking about, a lost love, surely? A girl back home?

 

“You used to make the best cookies...you brought them over every day at eleven...I took you flying once and you said you didn’t like heights.” Poe finds your fingers, intertwines them with his own, and pulls your hand to his dry, cracked lips. He kisses the back of your hand tenderly, and then wraps his other hand, which is bandaged all the way down to his forearm, around your hand too.

 

“My mother...she thinks we should be married in the fall...but not too late. Just before the flowers go away. She says...my father would have liked you, too. I think he would have, Blossom…”   
  
You feel a surge of emotion for Poe, something that swells in your chest and threatens to overwhelm you, but the gentle brush of Poe’s fingertips against yours brings you back just enough. Poe is blinking rapidly now, trying to see something that isn’t there. 

 

“Finn, no, we can’t go flying today...the basket’s in my room...dog’s in the backyard where he always is...not there, it doesn’t go there…”   
  


He keeps speaking, fragments of thoughts and sentences and moments you know aren’t for you, but you listen anyway, for this man who you know has a very unlikely chance of making it home. You wonder how serious his head wound is, if it’s just superficial or if it’s something much more serious. 

 

Poe stops rambling, his eyes closing once more as he weakly squeezes your hand. 

 

“Do you love me, Blossom? Even if I won’t make it home?” 

 

“Yes,” you say, without hesitation. It’s the right thing to say, even if you don’t know him, even if you aren’t the girl he’s talking about. You think to yourself how much more heartbreaking it is for Poe to know he won’t make it, but he’s still spilling his heart to you, because you’ll be the last person he sees.

 

“Don’t leave yet, Blossom, please. Please stay,” Poe says, and he’s pleading with you, his eyes damp with unshed tears. 

 

“I won’t,” you promise. “I’ll stay right here.”

 

Poe closes his eyes again, and when he does, a few tears escape. He reaches up to wipe them away, but instead, you use your towel to wipe them for him. He presses his lips together, like he’s thinking, and then he smiles, faintly. 

 

“I’ll miss you, Blossom,” Poe whispers, his body shaking with cold. “I’ll miss you so much.” 

  
His hand tightens around yours once more, and, knowing you’re within the safety of the curtain, you lean down and kiss his cheek, feeling him sigh against your cheek as your lips touch his stubbled face. 

 

“I love you, Posy,” you whisper back, and you reach for his other hand, bringing it to your cheek. His hands are cold, but as he feels the warmth of your skin, he relaxes a little. A moment almost too fast for you to process passes, and you suddenly feel his hands go limp in yours, feel a final breath escape his lips. 

 

Alarmed, you pull back, staring down at him, trying to process what’s happening, or just happened. Poe is laying against the pillows, his eyes closed, a soft smile on his face. He could be sleeping. You want to shake him, wake him up, beg him to come back, but you know it would be in vain. Hot tears burn your cheeks as you wipe your eyes with your itchy, starched sleeve, and before the ward sister can come in, you reach for Poe’s hand and slip the silver ring off his finger and tuck it into the pocket of your apron. You’ll look at the papers, find a way to send it home to the Solo boy. Maybe you’ll write a letter. You’ll keep Poe’s promise. 

 

You’re not sure when, but the curtain is drawn back from the other side, and another nurse draws a sheet over Poe’s face. You reach out weakly for him one last time, but he’s carried off before you can say anything else. You wipe at your face again, excusing yourself to the washroom to rinse your face and change your apron.

 

You spend the rest of the night in your bed, huddled under your covers, wondering what it could have been like if Poe made it. You wonder if maybe you could have made it work, if maybe you could have gone back to his home and met his family, and his friend, Finn. You wonder if he could have loved you the way he said he did. 

  
You wonder if you could have ever been his Blossom. 

**Author's Note:**

> if you've made it this far, two things: 
> 
> one, please don't kill me because hurting Poe (and listening to the Atonement OST) absolutely destroyed me
> 
> two, I hope you liked this! I love angst a lot, and I'm hoping on doing more of it in the future! 
> 
> come say hello to me on [my Tumblr](http://www.jedidameron.tumblr.com) too!


End file.
